“I fucked up his life that day fifteen years ago. I dragged him out of the closet in front of the whole damn country, when he wasn’t ready.” Rick lifted his eyes to Saxon’s as if willing him to understand. “I owe him.” He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Even if I didn’t owe him, I am a warrior, he is not. We,” he circled his hand taking in all the people in the room. “We go to war, so people like him don’t have to.”
Fuck, he was right, Saxon knew it. But, bah, he hated this. Never again would he give the others shit about wanting to protect the warriors who owned their hearts. ARGH, now he got it. “You are not going alone.”
“I didn’t think I would be.” The mask Rick had been hiding his emotions behind finally cracked and he smiled at Saxon. “Unless you decided to be a dick about things. Then I’d have taken Bauer and Marks.”
Zenko spewed coffee across the table, “Me and Noble?” He glared at Rick. “Why?”
“Because you two stubborn assholes are legends no matter if you want to admit it or not.” Rick smirked at Zenko. “Plus you’re wider than me, so bullets would hit you first.”
“Dick.”
“It’s Ri—” Saxon slapped a hand over his mouth, muffling the rest of what he had been about to say. He put his mouth to Rick’s ear and whispered. “If you finish that, you’ll have a new call sign.”
Rick nodded in response. Oops, he had forgotten how that shit worked. Hadn’t he learned his lesson with Black Squadron? It was better he just moved right along and didn’t make a big deal out of what Zenko had called him. Although… maybe it was better than his Black Squadron name? He considered it for a second but decided if anyone was going to change his call sign it should be his own team. “So… where do I go?”
“Claudio sent me intel just before we called all y’all in here.” Noble twisted to reach around Max and pick up a note pad. “If you’re sure you want to do this, then you are going to Naples to do the swap, you for McCarthy.”
“Roger that.” Naples wasn’t so bad. He could do Naples, at least he was somewhere near a US base. He’d just have to make it there with Joe and they would be safe. He hoped.
“Tell me we’re going after these fuckers?” Saxon knew it was a stupid question. Knew it was ridiculous. but the words were out of his mouth before he could stop them.
“We’re going after them like flies on shit.” Noble confirmed. “I will not fail.”
Hearing the promise in the final words of the Navy Seal Creed Noble Bauer lived and breathed by did more to solidify his resolve than anything else could have.‘I will not fail.’Thosewords told him Noble would go balls to the wall to make sure Rick and Joe McCarthy, now their principles, both made it out alive.
* * *
Rick crackedeach of his knuckles in turn. He didn’t like this. His guts told him something was off. He resented the fact that he didn’t have the resources he normally would have as part of Black Squadron. But things could be worse. At least he knew Red Squadron, first by reputation within the Black Ops community and most recently by spending the last few days or so with them. Plus, Red Squadron had Saxon, and they had rescued him when the mafia had him earlier. All that added up to a trust he rarely gave outside of his own team, but was happy to give these men.
Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Saxon as he drove with easy confidence. Maybe it was a stupid idea to hope for more than they already had. But he was tired of being alone. He wanted someone to come home to, damn it, didn’t he deserve that too? Living this life was hard enough, doing it without someone to cushion the deadly lows that came after a mission went to hell… that sucked.
Being with Saxon without the man’s voice filling the air as he muttered and bitched about everything and anything was weird as hell. He knew Sax was worried about this. Hell, he was too. But he had no choice, Saxon just had to understand that. If he was pissed, then he’d either get over it or they would know this thing between them was never going to work. To fill the silence, he reached out to switch on the radio.
“Leave it off.”
Seriously, if Saxon expected them to drive all the way to freaking Naples in silence, then he was in for one hell of a shock. His brain needed something to do, even if it was just listening to the fucking radio. “I’m bored.” There was only so many times he could go over the intel. His eyes were crossed from the number of maps and personnel files on who was potentially behind this that he’d reviewed in the last few hours. Top of that list was his father. He now knew way too much about that asshole.
“I’m concentrating.” Saxon didn’t take his eyes off the road. “People over here drive like they are fucking late for church.” He slammed his hand on the horn as a van cut into their lane in front of them. “Asshole didn’t even check his damn mirrors. Who the fuck gifted you a license, idiot?”
“Yelling at him doesn’t mean he’ll hear you.” He braced a hand on the dash to prevent himself from flying forward when he spotted the brake lights on the van in front. “He probably did check the mirrors but thought he could make it.”
“He didn’t get very fucking far, did he?” Saxon hit the warning lights to let the vehicles behind them in the left-hand lane know that the traffic was slowing down.
“Put on some music,” Rick advised. “It will soothe your soul and make this trip more pleasurable for us both.”
“No.”
What the hell flew up his ass?“Why not?”
“I am concentrating,” Saxon repeated. “’Sides, the radio is broken.”
“I’ll use my phone.” He reached for the cell Red Squadron had given him from their box of burners. He could Bluetooth something to break up the awkward silence.
“No,” Saxon flipped on the flicker and moved into the middle lane. “There is a gas station coming up, you can get a book or something.” Saxon pressed the coms unit in his ear, “TOC, Bravo Three, we’re stopping at the gas station in five clicks.”
“Roger that, Bravo Three.”Max didn’t question why they were stopping. GPS trackers told him where Saxon and Rick were and when planning this route, they had already earmarked some service stations where it was considered safest to stop. This next one was one of those stops.
Was he insane? Since when did either of them read books? Well, he supposed Saxon might enjoy reading; after all, this was the longest time they had ever spent together, so there was lots of shit they didn’t know about each other. “A book?”
